


Eyes Wide Open

by TheTyphonSerpent



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II
Genre: Blood, Cheesy romance, Fluff, M/M, muggling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-18
Updated: 2017-12-18
Packaged: 2019-02-16 07:40:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13049553
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheTyphonSerpent/pseuds/TheTyphonSerpent
Summary: Temporarily blinded in battle, Fenris must rely on Anders to be his eyes until they can reach his darktown clinic.





	Eyes Wide Open

**Author's Note:**

  * For [protect-him (protect_him)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/protect_him/gifts).



> This was another piece written for Let It Glow 2017. 
> 
> Find me on tumblr: http://typhonserpent.tumblr.com/

Everything happened so fast.

One second, Fenris saw Isabella collapsed on the ground, her shirt stained with an ugly red blotch. Blood was dribbling from the dragons mouth and nose, though it was hard to tell whose blood it was at this point. The next second, a flash of light, and intense heat. He had a vague recollection turning around, making some attempt at shielding himself, but then came the bang. Blackness. Silence.

He could neither see nor hear but he felt footsteps around him. Something knelt by him, and he could smell the elfroot and salves that always clung to Anders’ coat.

He couldn’t move a muscle, his attempt at breathing were shallow thanks to the pain in his ribs with every inhale. He was vaguely aware of shouting and warmth to his backside, as though someone had lit a fire there.

There was another gap to his memory then. The next moment he remembered, he was being moved. That woke him up. The shot of pain in his side the second he was risen more than a few inches from the ground. “AH!” Fenris shouted in pain, clutching his side.

He heard Garret’s voice. “What’s wrong with him?”

“Broken ribs, probably. Concussion. Then there’s the burns.” Anders replied. Fenris felt a finger on his cheek, just under his eye. His nose was assaulted by the bitter scent of elfroot that had seeped into callouses on Anders’ hands. He swatted the hand away.

“Well then, see if I try and heal you again.” Anders huffed.

Fenris groaned a response.

“I think I have some potions in storage back home.” Garret said, “I’ll take Isabella if you want to take Fenris.”

“Potions?” Fenris managed to groan.

“We’re out.” Garret replied.

“I think I have enough mana left to take care of your ribs. Your eyes will have to wait until we reach the clinic.” Anders said.

His ears twitched at the familiar hum of healing magic, and he inhaled a deep, greedy breath as the weight was lifted from his lungs.

“Better?” Anders asked.

Fenris pulled himself into a sitting position, hand on the side of his head. There was a dull ache in his skull. Removing one gauntlet and touching the tips of his fingers to his face, he found a thick set of ragged bandages wrapped around his eyes.

He felt a hand grab his wrist and pull it down. Fenris yanked his hand back. “Don’t touch it!” Anders ch1ided, “You’ll make it worse!”

“What happened?” Fenris asked as he fumbled around for where he’d discarded the gauntlet.

“The dragon fire hit a crate where the miners had stored some runes.” Anders explained, “The ones they use to blast further into the mine. I don’t know why the bloody idiots had them stored outside, though I suppose a dragon attack leaves little room for logic.”

Fenris heard metal scrape against dirt and felt his gauntlet touch his hand. Anders had moved it to him.

“You probably took some shrapnel from the blast.” Anders continued, “I’ve also heard of shockwaves doing damage to eyes. It isn’t permanent, but I used up most of my mana helping Hawke and healing Isabella. I have some lyrium potions back at the clinic, though. I can heal you there.”

Fenris sheathed his hand in the gauntlet again. He pulled himself to his feet. “Let’s be off then.”

He was two steps forward before he realized that his back felt lighter than usual. Reaching for his sword, his hand gripped air.

“You can’t possibly be considering going there on your own.” Anders quipped.

Fenris huffed, crossing his arms. He felt Anders poke his shoulder, then take his hand and set the familiar weight of the blade’s hilt in his palm. Fenris sheathed the sword, easily working from muscle memory.

He had his lips pursed. On the one hand, not in any way trusting of the mage, especially in his current condition. On the other, fully aware that he wouldn’t be able to survive on his own.

He extended a hand, which Anders took.

“Good, looks like that dragon knocked some sense into you.” Anders said.

x - X - x

It was warmer than Kirwall than on the coast. The buildings created a shield against the wind, and the mist from the ocean only settled into the city streets in the earliest hours of the morning. He could hear the clanking of mugs and muffled chatter as they passed the Hanged Man. It was always accented by the rhythm of an out-of-tune lute.

He paused, picking out a familiar voice amidst the buzz.

“-RIPPED open the darkpawn’s jaw! Screaming all the while, ‘You won’t take my brother, you worthless maggot’!” Varric’s voice bellowed.

“Hm. I don’t recall that part.” Anders hummed.

Fenris turned his head towards the voice of the mage, “Hawke does not speak of what happened in the deep roads.”

“I imagine not. Though it wasn’t nearly as glamorous as Varric may have you believe.” Anders gave Fenris’ arm a tug, reminding Fenris that he had no choice but to follow where Anders led.

He heard a shuffling behind them and peeked over his shoulder, but still attached to Anders, he continued following him while the mage babbled on.

“Carver collapsed just as we made our way out of the deep roads. Bloody fool had been blighted for maker-knows-how long. Of course, all of us were feeling lightheaded from eating mushrooms and drinking moss water for the past few days. Are you listening to me?”

Fenris had stopped. “Do you hear that?”

“No, I don’t hear a thing. You’re being ridiculous, the sooner we get to the clinic the better.”

“If you would stop babbling, you would hear it!” Fenris yanked his hand away and shoved past the mage.

“Fenris, wait!”

“I have been to your clinic before, I know the way.” Fenris said before his feet went out from under him. He felt Anders make a grab for his hand, but the combined weight of the elf and his armor managed to drag them both down. The clang of metal against stone rang as the pair tumbled down the flight of stairs and landed in a crumpled heap of limbs at the bottom.

They remained that way for a moment.

Fenris was the first to move, groaning as he tried to push the mage off of him. Suddenly, the weight was yanked off of him, and he heard Anders gasp.

Two pairs of boots shuffled a step back. The stranger had Anders in a headlock, knife to one cheek.

“Coinpurse now or your friend gets it.” The man growled.

“Fenris …” Anders whispered, then flinched as the tip of the knife pressed into his skin.

“Shove it, nuglicker.”

Fenris slowly rose to kneeling height. His fingertips twitched. On any other night he would have already drawn his sword and made fast work of the mugger. He clicked his teeth.

“Faster now, or I hurt his pretty face.” The mugger growled again. Fenris rose to his feet

“Fenris, your left-ow!”

“Aw, now look at what you gone and made me do.”

Fenris extended a hand to his left, and was met with a wall. A wall? No that couldn’t be right.

A wall.

He had to trust Anders. He couldn’t see the glow of the lyrium, but he could always feel a familiar tug of his skin when the tattoos flared.

“Andraste’s tits!” The mugger shouted.

His ghostly hand passed through the wall and grasped a smooth, cylindrical object on the other side. No sooner did he remove it than did Anders shout, “Throw it!”

Fenris threw it. He heard the sound of glass shattering against stone, then metal hitting the sidewalk as the mugger dropped his knife. That familiar scrape sounded as he ran away, feet scuffing the ground with ever step.

Fenris reached out a hand, searching for the mage. “Are you hurt?” He asked.

A hand took his own, pressed it against Anders cheek. Fenris felt a patch of wetness and smelled the coppery scent of blood. “It’s worse than it looks, just a little nick.”

Fenris clicked his tongue, “Dare I ask what you had me throw at him?”

“Hm? Oh, it was a glass.”

“A glass what?”

“Just a glass. For water.” Anders paused for a second, then chuckled, “I had a hunch your glowing would be enough to scare him off. Muggers are notoriously stupid. If they were smart, they wouldn’t be muggers.”

Fenris withdrew his hand, curling a lip, “You risked your neck on a hunch?”

“Are you going to growl at me like a dog all night or are you going to admit that I was right for once?”

He scoffed, “You took a gamble and were lucky it paid off, even if the odds were in your favor.”

Three seconds past where all Fenris could hear was a waif in the alleyway coughing.

“That was … shockingly poetic.” Anders said.

“I thought I 'growled like a dog’.”

Anders heaved a sigh. “Alright, I take it back. Let’s stop nitpicking and start moving. Now I have two wounds to treat.”

Taking his hand again, Anders led them the remainder of the way. The thin door, hinges rusted, creaked when he opened it.

Anders led him a few paces in, then set a hand on his shoulder, pushing him down. “Sit there.” He instructed, and Fenris obeyed.

He heard some shuffling, glass clanking together, the pop of a cork. Anders returned to Fenris and knelt in front of him.

There was always this pull when magic was performed around him, similar to the tug in his skin when the lyrium tattoos were activated. The blue light came into focus from behind the bandages, then darkness again. Anders tugged the bandages free and unwound them from his face.

The sight before him was ridiculous.

Anders was topless, his brown tunic missing and his coat open to reveal his bare chest. Nearly half his face was coated in blood from a cut that ran from the edge of his lip to the center of his cheekbone. It was dripping onto his feathered pauldrons, too.

He was wearing a crooked smile.

“Your shirt …” Fenris voiced.

“Oh,” Anders looked down, “I had to improvise bandages or else your eyes might have become infected.”

He clicked his tongue, “You should heal yourself now.”

“Actually,” Anders held up the empty vial in his hand, “This was my last lyrium potion. I’ll just have to treat myself without magic.”

Fenris rose and made his way to the shelf behind Anders. He picked up a bowl and reached for a basket of clean rags. “I will help.” He said.

“I’ve treated far worse, I told you it’s not as bad as it looks.”

“Sit. I will help.”

For once, Anders stopped talking, and obeyed the command. He took the same chair Fenris had.

Fenris went to the water pump in the corner and filled the bowl. He returned to Anders and, dipping the rag in the water, began to wipe the blood away from his face.

After dipping the rag in the water several more times, he discovered that Anders wasn’t completely wrong. The more clean the wound became, the more it was revealed to be only a hair’s width deep. Nasty as it looked, it would not require stitches.

Fenris flipped the rag over to the dry half and pressed it against Anders’ cheek.

Anders set a hand over Fenris’, holding it in place.

“Thank you. I can take it from here.”

His eyes were earthy, the inner ring tinged with a dark border, making a gradient from black to brown that flared out from his pupils. Equally intense was the way Anders gazed back at him, eyes meeting eyes for a second that lasted an eternity, before Anders closed the gap between them.

Anders hand moved away from his cheek and rested on the back of Fenris’ neck. The elf allowed Anders to pull him closer, deepening the kiss. The mage sighed, and Fenris could feel tension pouring out of his body.

He pulled away, looking into Anders’ eyes, and really, truly seeing him for the first time.


End file.
